FedEx Plans For 70,000 Holiday Hires As Covid-19 Keeps More Consumers Out Of Stores

TOPLINE

In a sign that e-commerce will remain strong throughout an “unprecedented peak holiday shipping season,” shipper FedEx said Thursday it plans to hire 70,000 U.S. workers for the holidays, as Covid-19 continues to keep consumers largely housebound.

KEY FACTS

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 500,000: FedEx already has half a million “team members,” globally, including full- and part-time workers.

key background

The calendar snatched two days from the holiday season last year, giving shoppers and shippers less time to make intended recipients happy.  Total volume topped and estimated 2.7 billion packages from Black Friday to New Year’s Eve, up from about 2.3 billion in 2018, according to Bloomberg, which cited estimates from SJ Consulting Group Inc. UPS and FedEx struggled a bit to accommodate that deluge within the shorter time frame: FedEx delivered an estimated 95% of packages on-time, down from 97.6% in the prior year, while UPS’s performance slipped to 96.8% from 98.5%, Bloomberg said, quoting  Satish Jindel, founder of SJ Consulting. This year there are 29 days between  Black Friday and Christmas.  Some major retailers, including Target, already have announced plans to be closed on Thanksgiving, giving shoppers even more reason to fill their holiday wish lists online.